is life meaningless?
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Is Life Meaningless?Jean Kazez
Philosophy Department, SMU
PreludeA few words about
solidarity vs. agreement
Alex Rosenberg’scheerful nihilism
Is he right that life is meaningless??
Professor of Philosophy, Duke University
BackgroundThe debate about God and
the meaning of life
An existential crisis
Everything comes to an end … my life is meaningless … I may as well be dead!
Tolstoy, age 51, 1879
Tolstoy’s Conversion“As I looked around at people, at humanity as a whole,I saw that they lived and affirmed that they knew the meaning of life.”
Tolstoy, A Confession (1879)
Tolstoy on thenecessity of faith
“… only in faith can we find the meaning and possibility of life.”Faith gives “an infinite meaning to the finite existence of man; a meaning that is not destroyed by suffering, deprivation or death. Tolstoy, A Confession (1879)
∞
Standard Atheist Response
NO, NONo GodNo necessity of God for
meaningfulness
Meaning OF life cosmic purpose [need God]
Meaning IN life having your own plans, goals, ultimate aims [don’t need God]
My primary goal is to be a great climber
MEANING IN LIFE
My primary goal is to raise my daughters
MEANING IN LIFE
I’m working on world peace, thank you very much
MEANING IN LIFE
∞
Needed more fulfilling goals, not faith
For meaning in lifeGod is not necessary
Enter: TroubleCan there really be meaning IN life?
Meaning IN life is only possible if…
Hillary has thoughts ABOUT peaceMichelle has thoughts ABOUT her daughtersMountain climber has thoughts ABOUT
mountains
ABOUTNESS IS PROBLEMATIC!
My brain weighs 2 poundsIt’s spongy
It’s wetIt has electric charge
And it has aboutness. ABOUTNESS?
Are these things possiblein natural, physical world?
SoulsThe selfFree willObjective moralityAboutness
Philosophy of aboutness (aka “intentionality”)
Franz BrentanoEdmund Husserl
Jerry FodorDaniel DennettRuth MillikanFred Dretske
Paul & Patricia ChurchlandJohn Searle
Rosenberg:ABOUTNESS DOESN’T
EXISTLike souls, fairies, witches,
ESP, heaven, destiny, etc. don’t exist
Can’t think aboutmountains
Can’t think aboutdaughters
Can’t think aboutworld peace
Life is meaningless!
NO MEANING OF LIFEBecause no God
NO MEANING IN LIFEBecause no aboutness
Rosenberg: life is
meaningless? What me worry?
∞
Rosenberg: Tolstoy just needed Prozac
Why no aboutness?Rosenberg’s argument why
aboutness doesn’t exist
Aboutness is unreal because
1) Paris too diffuse—what are the boundaries?
2) Neurons too simple—even sea slugs, rats, frogs have them; just “circuitry”.
Aboutness is unreal because3) Piling up doesn’t help—
“Piling up a lot of neural circuits that are not about anything at all can’t turn them into a thought about stuff out there in the world.”
Rosenberg, p. 184
Why should atheists pay attention?
SCIENTISM* – “The physical facts fix all of the facts.” What “floats” free of physical facts is
unreal, illusory.
NO GOD
NO ABOUTNESS
* Not a dirty word in Rosenberg’s view
How should we respond?
1. Dismiss Rosenbergas a nut
2. Agree, but secretlyVote for me, even though I
think God doesn’t exist, life is meaningless, and nobody has thoughts
about anything.
3. Dismiss Rosenberg’s view as “self-defeating”
I am not thinking about
anything or talking about
anything!
4. Reject scientism Come to atheism by another route—e.g.
argument from evil Say there are genuine facts that float free of
physical facts. Accept aboutness as “floater”
5. Rebut his argumentsHE SAID LIKE SAYING
“Piling up a lot of neural circuits that are not about anything at all can’t turn them into a thought about stuff out there in the world.”
Rosenberg, p. 184
Piling up a lot of atoms that aren’t conscious can’t make me conscious.
6. Explain how aboutness arises from physical facts
How can there be aboutness in
physical world?hard question,
piles of literature
Fly detector
A fly-detector has physical states ABOUT flies.
Paris detector
That’s Paris!
Paris detector
Let’s go to Paris!
Mountain detector Daughter detector
World peace detector
Mission accomplishedAboutness and meaning in life defended
Meaning in LifeExpanding on idea
1) Love“Love saves us … from squandering our lives in vacuous activity that is fundamentally pointless”“Love makes it possible … for us to engage wholeheartedly in activity that is meaningful”-- Harry Frankfurt, The Reasons of Love
2) Objective attractiveness
“Meaning arises from loving objects worthy of love and engaging with them in a positive way.”
“Meaning arises when subjective attraction meets objective attractiveness.”
-- Susan Wolf, Meaning in Life and Why it Matters (2010)
2) Objective attractiveness
An activity is objectively attractive when—
A. Benefit is not received only by me—
but shared by others too
B. Benefit is not seen only by me— but real, factual
Susan Wolf, Meaning in Life and Why it Matters (2010)
3) A meaningful lifeNot just lots of different meaningful activities, but goals that give shape to life as a whole
What is meaningless?(some examples from online life)
Checking email and Twitter endlessly (you don’t love it)
Malicious online bullying (not objectively attractive)
Endless chatter at blogs (gives no shape to life)
What adds meaning to our lives?Three examples
1) Raising children2) Working for social justice3) Skilled X-ing
Had all the elements of meaning but didn’t know it
Blinded by … religion? Sexism?
∞
BibliographyAlex Rosenberg, The Atheist’s Guide to Life: Enjoying Life without Illusions
Jean Kazez, Review of Rosenberg in Free Inquiry (August/September 2012)Leo Tolstoy, A Confession
Harry Frankfurt, The Reasons of Love
Susan Wolf, Meaning in Life and Why it Matters
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – look up Intentionality; Causal theories of mental contentNicholas Carr, The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains
Links at my blog—kazez.blogspot.com
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